Check if YOUR ESA is Contribution Based, Income Related, or Both?

[nukecad]

Hi Geordiemick,

The letters can be very confusing. Lets see if we can sort it out for you.
(The prescription fines may be a red herring, there are problems with that system at the moment).

Fine it seems that your son is on CB ESA, but does he also have an IR component?

The easiest way to see is to ask which group he is in, WRAG or SG, and if he has any premiums added to his payments.
If your not sure then if you could tell us how much money he receives for ESA we could work it out from that.

It would also be useful to know if he was a transfer from Incapacity Benefit to ESA, and if he gets any other benefit, like PIP or ESA (or maybe Housing Benefit).

The quick answer to your question is that CB ESA Will NOT migrate to UC.
But any Income Related benefit he has, including any possible IR component of his ESA, will do eventually.
This is why it's important to know just which your ESA payments are made up of.

(PS. Although not legal you can probably safely ignore the prescription fines, if you phone and challenge them they usually just cancel them, and nobody has been taken to court about not paying them for around 4 years now. Of course there is no guarantee they won't start again, but as I said above that system is in a mess at the moment so it's unlikely).

[geordiemick]

My son is at home but we are on holiday so don't have the paperwork.
He did transfer from incap benefit with income support years ago.
Regarding the prescription fines, although it was very confusing the contact centre were good. They eventually waived the fines but we still had to pay the prescription charges. Now he has a HC2 exemption.
He tells us he got a hefty letter at weekend which worries him and is probably the cause of a bout of severe shingles, but he sees his doc for regular appointment this morning.
When home, I'll get the figures.
Thanks for the support.
Actually, years ago I was an executive officer in the ministry of social security, sickness benefits. So if I find this stuff hard to figure, God help the rest!
PS how do I make it so I get email notifications of responses?
Mick
pps he does get PIP, but is just fearful of UC and changes this might mean to him

[nukecad]

No problems,

As said the prescription fines system is currently in a mess and they do usually waive the fine if you call them.

Not sure what the 'hefty letter' may be, but I suspect it may be about the transfer from IB to ESA.
You may have seen on the news that they cocked that up and are now contacting everybody who transfered about it.
If that's what it is then it's not a problem, we are getting quite used to advising/dealing with those. (And members here have had thousands in backpay).

I wouldn't worry too much about UC yet, it's still years off for most of us.
And PIP and CB ESA stay outside of UC anyway.

As you say he transfered from IB and IS then it's probable that he has [/b]both[/b] CB ESA and IR ESA.
(Or maybe not if they cocked his transfer up).
When you get the paperwork, and let us know what his weekly ESA payment is, then we can confirm that.

To get email notifications-
When making/replying to a thread click on 'Advanced' under the editor.
This takes you to an editor with more options.
Scroll down and you will see an option labled 'Subscription',
Tick the box to subscribe to the thread and the notification options become available.
Select the option you want.
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You can also set it so that you are automatically subscribed to every thread you make or reply in.
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If/when you want to stop the emails then-
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[worried33]

Has anyone on CB + IR topups migrated yet? I am very curious how the UC IR topup will work since CB ESA does not migrate.

Or is this specific thing already clarified in the new regulations?

[geordiemick]

Our area North Tyneside is now UC. So if he changes any circumstances then it's UC.
Thanks for email help; I'm doing this on smart phone and its a bit tricky.

[nukecad]

Has anyone on CB + IR topups migrated yet? I am very curious how the UC IR topup will work since CB ESA does not migrate.

It works like this:

You get the CB ESA paid fortnightly, same as now but without the IE top-up.

You get UC paid monthly.
The UC is calculated as the full UC entitlement you would be due, and then the ESA payment is deducted as 'Income' before the UC payment is made.

There may be a slight perceived issue there with some months having more ESA payments than others; but it's only a perception and not real.
Usually it will be 2 ESA payments a month, but the occasional month will have 3 just because the way the dates fall.
So the occasional month will pay less UC, but that will be balanced by an 'extra' ESA payment that month, so you'll end up with the same overall for the month.

[nukecad]

Thanks for email help; I'm doing this on smart phone and its a bit tricky.

I forgot to add:

You can subscribe to, and so get alerts about, any thread and not just those you have posted in.

To do that look at the top of the thread and you'll see a sub-menu bar -
'Thread Tools' 'Adminitrative' ' Search Thread' 'Rate This Thread' ' Display'

Click on 'Thread Tools' and it give you an option to subscribe/unsubscribe from the thread.

[geordiemick]

The letter that spooked my son was about the re-assessment to see if he qualifies for any IR addition to his ESA.
We phoned the department; they were very helpful. He does not want to apply for this and they said he could in the future, if he wishes.
If he is moved from support group to work group, then CB ESA will last only 52 weeks then he will have to apply for IR addition.
My thought tho, is if we his parents should shuffle off this mortal coil and leave him with more than £1600, will he still qualify. And I just read this about "new style ESA" that has no savings limit. https://www.gov.uk/employment-suppor...e/types-of-esa

[nukecad]

'New Style' ESA is simply Contribution Based ESA that has been claimed in a Full Service UC area, (where you can't claim IR ESA anymore).
It is no different from existing CB ESA apart from the name.

(The 'New Style' name tells you that it is governed by a different set of regulations, but these are just the old regulations with any references to IR ESA removed).

Savings/capital of over £16K would disqualify from entitlement to any Income Related benefits.

Was your son a transfer from IB to ESA?
If so when did this happen?
(If he was then he could be owed thousands).

[worried33]

I can definitely see this causing more confusion and underpayments, what are the chances of people getting CB ESA and not been given UC topups they qualify for?